Adsorption of Cyanide Anion from Aqueous Solutions Using Zinc Oxide Nano-adsorbent

Adsorption of cyanide ion from aqueous solutions using zinc oxide nanoparticles and the affecting factors such as pH, concentration of cyanide ion, adsorbent dosage, contact time and temperature have been studied in this paper. The optimal conditions for adsorption of cyanide anion on nano zinc oxide were obtained at pH=6, contact time 80 min, adsorbent dosage 0.07g, temperature 15°C and initial concentration of 250 mg/l. Under these optimal conditions, the highest percentage of adsorption of cyanide was obtained to be 96%. Moreover, the results showed that experimental data is best fitted with Langmuir isotherm equation rather than Freundlich and Temkin isotherms. The maximum adsorption capacity obtained about 24.85 mg/g. In addition, kinetic studies showed that the adsorption of cyanide anion on nano-adsorbent zinc oxide complied well with second-order kinetics model.